Why This Role Stands Out
As a Founding Engineer at Clera, you'll have the opportunity to shape the technical direction of an innovative AI startup, building impactful products from the ground up. This role is ideal for a seasoned full-stack and AI engineer who thrives on ownership and is eager to contribute to a fast-growing company. Join a dynamic founding team and make your mark in the logistics industry by applying today.
Quick Overview
Job Description
About the Role
This is an early, high-ownership engineering role at a seed-stage vertical AI startup building autonomous tooling for the global freight and logistics industry. You will join a small founding team in Munich to design, build, and scale the core product, shaping technical direction from the ground up. The role combines hands-on full-stack engineering, production AI/ML work, and real product ownership.
What You'll Do
Own and personally design, build, and maintain the most critical parts of the product.
Build reliable full-stack features that make users radically more efficient.
Evaluate, benchmark, and fine-tune AI capabilities to maximize domain accuracy and context.
Continuously experiment with new model releases, frameworks, and agentic techniques in production.
Ship promising approaches quickly and iterate based on data and user feedback.
Navigate and improve large-scale, complex legacy code to add structure and scalability.
Engineer infrastructure and automation to support heavy data and AI workloads.
Collaborate closely with founders and teammates as a hands-on, high-ownership contributor.
What We're Looking For
Practical, hands-on experience with AI/ML and LLM systems: benchmarking, fine-tuning, and running experiments in production.
Strong full-stack engineering skills with fluency across backend and cloud environments.
Fluent in Python; familiarity with Go is a strong plus.
Domain knowledge in logistics or freight forwarding.
Evidence of building robust, real-world production systems.
Comfort working with complex legacy codebases and engineering for scale.
Strong CS fundamentals, intellectual humility, and exceptional self-discipline.
2 to 3 years of professional experience, or equivalent through relevant projects or a demonstrable track record.
Prior startup or entrepreneurial experience, with a results-oriented and autonomous work style.
Strong spoken English sufficient for fluid technical discussion.
Willingness to work on-site in Munich or to relocate there.
Compensation & Benefits
Salary range: 60,000 to 90,000 EUR annually. Equity participation via options (up to 1%, with top-ups possible). Visa sponsorship is not available.
Location
On-site in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. This role requires regular in-person presence; remote work is not an option.